Those Long Summer Nights
by NotAliceInHerWonderland
Summary: Theme:Goodnight/Good Evening 500 - 1500words    Charlie is home for the summer but he cant get to sleep. Instead, he heads downstairs and takes a trip down memory lane to all the summers he's stayed up late in the past.


_**Theme: Goodnight/Good Evening**_

**Those long summer nights**

Charlie groaned and flopped over onto his stomach. One of these nights he'd get a decent nights' sleep. Tonight wasn't that night, though. He lay awake listening to the rain tapping softly against his window. Any other night he would have hunted out an old broom from the broom shed and took a spin around the burrow to settle his mind but the blasted weather wasn't on his side.

Not to say that he didn't like the rain or that he didn't like flying in the rain, but at almost 3 in the morning he really couldn't be bothered with it.

It was the lack of noise that did it for him. During the day you'd be lucky to find a minute of peace at the burrow during the summer - especially this summer with the order in and out, and Harry and Hermione staying over. But nights at the burrow? They were something different entirely.

Back in Romania there was no such thing as a quite night. He'd lie in bed listening to the chatter of his fellow handlers who were on the night shift, and the deep breathing of the closest dragons. He could hear the mewls from the newly hatched dragons over at the hatchery waiting for their midnight feed. Every so often footsteps would pass by his tent as shifts swapped over. There was so much going on during nights on the reserve.

The Romanian weather too... he missed it whenever he was back home at the burrow. There was something about sitting outside in the middle of the night while the warmth of the day still lingered in the air that he just couldn't get enough of.

Truth was, he missed good old English weather too. That was until it left him trapped in his room unable to sleep on nights like this one...

With another groan he pushed himself out of bed and headed for the door. There was no point in lying around doing nothing. Ice cream time? Oh, yes.

Charlie grinned to himself as he made his way downstairs, remembering all of the late night ice cream fests he'd had over the years.

He remembered the summer before he started 4th year, sitting in the kitchen with Bill and a large tub of Vanilla ice cream between them. They'd talked for hours about all sorts, especially OWL year. Just a few hours later Bill's results came through. He'd been ecstatic, and ended up falling asleep at the table while the mini party went on around him, letter still clutched tight in his hand. Again, Charlie smiled at the memory.

Summer before 5th year. His hormones had been raging like wild fire over the weeks at home and he couldn't get to sleep. A simple floo call to Tonks had solved that problem... He hoped no one realized he was the reason the old wooden table in the back of Dad's shed was broken... He grinned. Chocolate ice cream. A brilliant end to the night.

Char paused at the top of the last flight of stairs and sat down, enjoying the memory ride. Summer before he started 6th year – his own summer waiting for his OWL results to come through. Transfiguration was a goner, he was sure. And Herbology. Blimey he'd never failed so badly at Herbology before.

His Dad had sat up with him that night when he came in late from a busy week at work. The ice cream had been his idea. Strawberry flavor. Char missed the old times when he could just sit, him and Dad, and talk about stuff. Bill was great to talk to, but Dad was better… Sometimes. There was some things Charlie, even now, was in no rush to tell his Dad about. Like the time he'd been caught by McGonagall with his pants around his ankles and handcuffed to the inside of a broom closet… He really didn't need to be sharing that bit of information. It was still hard to look McGonagall in the face without remembering her amused look as she questioned him for nearly ten minutes before finally freeing him. Tonks has yet to be forgiven for _that_ awkward situation.

Looking back on it now Charlie couldn't help but laugh. How many students could honestly say they'd been caught in that kind of situation by their head of house? He hadn't even lost points!

The old clock stuck the hour and Charlie glanced over at it. 3 am. He yawned. Ice cream time. As he made his way down the final few steps his last two summers came to mind.

The summer before his last year of school… The twins had been up late plotting their next attack on Hogwarts when he'd walked into the kitchen. One large tub of banana ice cream and their ideas started flying. Char had to admit, the twins had pretty fantastic imaginations… and the brains to bring those imaginings to live. He couldn't wait for the Great Feast that year. And that time he _did_ get detention off McGonagall. It had been worth every minute he spent scrubbing trophies, mind.

His final night at home before he headed off to the great unknowns of Romania. He'd been wracked with nerves, unsure how to feel about this next, quickly approaching stage in his life.

He'd been halfway through his third tub of raspberry ripple when Ginny had joined him. He could see the tear tracks down her cheeks from when she'd been crying. She'd been just the same before Bill left for Egypt. Somehow, he ended up sleeping on the sofa that night with Ginny curled up next to him, her tears finally replace with a satisfied smile after he'd promised to write to her every week.

He had written every week for the first couple of months, but truthfully? There was only so much one could write about, and only so many times he could write the same thing before he wanted nothing more than to rip up every sheet of parchment and refuse to put a quill to it again. He wrote every month or so after that which was a great relief. His free time was no longer clogged with sitting at a desk scrawling letters. Mum, Dad, Bill, Percy, the Twins, Ron, Ginny, Tonks… A guy needs his ice cream eating time!

Charlie had been so lost in his memories that he'd thought nothing of the fact that the light was on in the kitchen when he went it. A small gasp pulled him back out of his thoughts.

"Hey." He spotted the familiar rectangular tub on the table and grinned. "Mind if I share?"

He grabbed a spoon from the bench and pulled out a chair.

Hermione. His youngest brothers' friend. The book worm? Yeah, that was her. Charlie had seen her around the house, and remembered her from the World Cup, but he couldn't really say he'd ever spoken to her before.

She smiled and nodded, pushing the tub away from her.

He peered in. Mint choc chip. Another ice cream to add to his list. And another person to share it with added to it too. He grinned. Who would he be eating ice cream with next year? And what flavor? He might have to stock up on the rum and raisin the next time he was here…


End file.
